Twelve years before the Doom of Valyria, Daenys Targaryen had a prophetic dream where she saw the Doom of Valyria. She told her father Aenar about this, and Aenar fled with his family and household to Dragonstone to escape the inevitable doom that his daughter foresaw. The Dragonlords saw Aenar as a coward for this, and officially stripped House Targaryen of their legacy as Dragonlords. Aenar was famously known in Valyria as "Aenar the Exile".

Aenar would rule Dragonstone, and would then be succeeded by his son, Gaemon Targaryen, known as Gaemon the Glorious. Though the Targaryens brought five dragons with them to the island, four of them died, the survivor being Balerion the Black Dread. They had two dragon eggs, however, that hatched, giving birth to Vhagar and Meraxes.